Reviewing expenses

How to approve, reject, or request changes to expenses

Written by Herman Updated over a week ago

Expense reviewal gives you control over when expenses are synced to your accounting system. Users with the appropriate role can review expenses submitted by cardholders and other users in the organisation. This in turn helps you to ensure that expenses comply with your organisation’s requirements, to manage the reimbursement process, and to reclaim costs for invalid or incorrectly submitted expenses.

Before you start

If you are a user of Xero and Expend’s Xero integration, check your configuration to ensure that you are ready to start reviewing expenses:

In dashboard menu, click Integrations, and then click Xero.

Under Set Control Accounts, check that the Rejected Expenses mapping is not empty. If it is empty, set up this account and then click Save.Tip: To create the account without going to Xero, click the Create Xero Account button. Ensure that the account type is Current Asset.

Under Set Account Mappings, turn the Require Review Before Syncing Expenses setting on or off (see below for more information). Click Save.

The “Require Review Before Syncing Expenses” setting

When users save expense details on the Expend dashboard or in the Expend app, this setting determines when expense details (including attachments) are synced to your accounting platform.

If turned ON, expense details and attachments are synced only once an expense is approved or rejected. Rejected expenses are allocated to the Rejected Expenses control account.

If turned OFF, expense details and attachments are synced as soon as they are saved by the user. Expenses may still be approved or rejected.

Note that all Expend card transactions are synced to your accounting platform no matter whether this setting is turned on or off. The setting pertains to expense details added by the user – category (and whether the transaction is allocated to the mapped account), tax type and description, as well as attachments.

Reviewing expenses

You need the Administrator or Accountant role to review and approve expenses.

In the dashboard menu, click Review. A list of submitted expenses opens.

Select Awaiting Review (or another filter such as Changes Requested, Approved or Rejected) at the top of the page.

Click an expense in the list. Details and attachments are displayed on the right.

(Optional) To make any changes required to the expense, click Edit. You can change details, add and/or edit expense lines, and add attachments.

To approve the expense: Click Approve in the upper-right corner.If the expense can’t be approved: Click Review, select an outcome and optionally enter a comment, and then click Submit.

What happens next?

If you approve or reject an expense, and Require Review Before Syncing Expenses is turned on, the expense details and attachments submitted by the user are now synced to your accounting platform.

Depending on your settings, the outcome selected also effects the following:

Approved

In your accounting platform, the transaction is allocated to the account in the Chart of Accounts that is mapped to the selected Expend category.

“Approved by” and the name of the reviewer is added to the transaction.

Rejected

The transaction is allocated to the Rejected Expenses account in your accounting platform’s Chart of Accounts.

The cardholder is notified by email that the expense hasn’t been approved.

“Rejected by” and the name of the reviewer is added to the transaction.

Changes requested

If Require Review Before Syncing Expenses is turned on, details aren’t synced to your accounting platform at this point.

The cardholder is notified by email that changes are required.

Comment

The comment is simply recorded against the expense.

If Require Review Before Syncing Expenses is turned on, expense details aren’t synced to your accounting platform at this point.